A serious responsibility of a bishop is to insure the purity of teaching
in areas of faith and morals (cf. I Timothy 4:16). These teachings must
be in conformity with the universal and historic teachings found in
Sacred Scripture and Sacred Tradition and defined by the teaching office
of the Catholic Church. The beauty of Catholicism rests in part on its
ability to be clear.

Recently there has been high-profile press given to arguments concerning
when human life begins. I am concerned about clarity and any
misrepresentation of consistent Catholic teaching. My remarks are made
in response to numerous questions posed to me by good Catholics in our
own Diocese of Lake Charles who are confused by glib citations of
patristic authorities, such as St. Augustine, that life begins at some
other time than conception.

In response, I would say:

1. St. Augustine, one of our most revered Fathers, lived and wrote
almost 1,500 years ago; he did not see the world around him with a
scientific perspective as we know it today; as with early writers of
this and later periods, his concern was the nature of the immortal soul
and the human being; he approached this question primarily from the
perspective of theology and philosophy.

2. To answer a question such as when does life begin, science gives us a
quite adequate answer; according to one prominent embryology text, The
Developing Human: Clinically Oriented Embryology, by Keith L. Moore and
T.V.N. Persuad (7th Edition; Publ. Saunders, p. 16), ‘‘Human development
begins at fertilization when a male gamete or sperm (spermatozoon)
unites with a female gamete or oocyte (ovum) to produce a single cell, a
zygote. This highly specialized, totipotent cell marked the beginning of
each of us as a unique individual’’; if he were alive today, St.
Augustine would agree, because St. Augustine believed that there was no
‘‘disjunction’’ in what was known by faith and reason (cf. Catholic
Encyclopedia, 1981 ed., vol. 5, p. 808, ‘‘St. Augustine’’ on ‘‘Faith and
Reason’’); life begins at conception; no doubt St. Augustine would have
marveled at a uterine ultrasound and what it reveals about a human in
the womb;

3. The teaching that life in the womb is sacred has been consistently
taught by the Church from the beginning and is reflected in the
opposition of the Church for twenty centuries to abortion; please
consult the oldest catechism instruction of the Church, outside the
Sacred Scriptures, called the Didache or The Teaching of the Twelve
Apostles from the First Century A.D.; it reads as follows: ‘‘Do not kill
a fetus by abortion, or commit infanticide’’ (Didache, 2:2); also, noted
patristic scholars are in agreement that St. Augustine probably knew the
Didache and may have used it as a source in writing his own First
Catechetical Instruction.

4. To say in some way that the Fathers and Doctors of the Church in
centuries past taught otherwise than the Church’s consistent teaching on
the sacredness of life in the womb or that they were not sure when life
began is misleading and erroneous; for this reason, the official
Catechism of the Catholic Church states: ‘‘Human life must be respected
and protected absolutely from the moment of conception.... Since the
first century the Church has affirmed the moral evil of every procured
abortion. This teaching has not changed and remains unchangeable’’
(Catechism of the Catholic Church, #2270-2271).